Tag Archives: Sad Panda

It feels like I keep writing the same post over and over again: images of sexual harassment, police violence, military violence, more martyrs, young martyrs, poems and tributes to martyrs, satire against Morsi, against religious and political hypocricy, against censorship … Continue reading →

Days after the first anniversary of January 25, tensions between anti-regime activists and loyalists to the SCAF have now reached the cement walls and streets of Cairo. The graffiti war, a showdown between revolutionary street artists and a fanatical … Continue reading →

If you Google search Cairo Street Art, Ganzeer’s name is your top result. Countless interviews and features on the artist follow. As arguably the most recognized name on Cairo’s art scene today, it’s no surprise that Ganzeer is the most … Continue reading →

Graffiti is not meant to be permanent; but it is meant to produce a reaction, even if that reaction means removing it because it’s offensive, or an eyesore. However, when you’re a Faculty of Fine Arts in Cairo that teaches … Continue reading →

If you take graffiti off a street wall and put it inside a confined space, is it still graffiti? Does street art maintain its value when you remove the noise, the faces, and the life of the streets and put … Continue reading →

Artist Shank signs his name with a figure that somehow reminds me of Gorillaz pop art. Lately, the graffiti I’ve stumbled upon around Cairo seems to be predominantly faces of pop icons, political figures and cartoon characters, mostly Western references … Continue reading →

The walls of the Mogamaa are filled with protest graffiti. There’s rarely an empty space left between the large and colourful murals by HK, the witty caricature-like pieces by Hosny and the stencils by El Teneen, Sad Panda and many … Continue reading →

‘Stop taking photographs of this, go to a museum,’ he mutters as he walks past me. I’m standing in front of the American University in Cairo’s library wall, photographing a graffiti piece depicting video game characters Ryu and Mr. Bison, … Continue reading →

We meet under the most peculiar of circumstances. I’d been in touch with Sad Panda over Twitter about photographing his graffiti in the Cairo area of Masaken Sheraton; yet I, having the mental compass of a duck in the desert, … Continue reading →

‘Excuse me,’ he walks up to me as I hesitantly put my camera down, ‘What does this picture mean?’ He points at the Keizer stencil of Mickey Mouse on the grey wall. Mahmoud Bassiouny Street on a Saturday afternoon is … Continue reading →

It’s not that street art never existed in Cairo before January 25th; it’s just that it never breathed this vibrantly before. There’s something raw, quick, witty and unpredictable about street art that gives an identity to the city; be it … Continue reading →